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In 1954, David Oletski, was born at 4920 Logan Street in the Globeville neighborhood of Denver, Colorado. One of six children, he was raised in a large extended family of Polish Catholics. At the time of his grandmother’s death in 1978, he had 103 cousins living in Denver. During his youth his family was active in St. Joseph Catholic Church and Holy Rosary Church, both in the Globeville neighborhood. He attended St. Joseph’s Elementary and High Schools in Denver. For several decades David worked at the Nabisco plant in Globeville. For ten years he lived in Arvada, Colorado, returning to Globeville in 1989. David has been involved in several neighborhood and civic associations, including serving as president of Globeville Civic Association, member of Partners Against Graffiti, economic development committees, National Western Committee, Brown Fields and the ASARCO/Escamilla lawsuit and remediation. He currently lives next door to where he was born.

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Notes

In this interview David Oletski describes Globeville both past and present, the lack of city resources and recreation centers, need of neighborhood repairs, junk yard contamination and commercial pollution. He also discusses improvements and changes that are coming to area including a RTD station and National Western Stock Show, Platforms Open Space, Section 8 housing, and the 2013 Habitat for Humanity project to repair twenty-six homes in the neighborhood. He also discusses the flood of 1965, John F. Kennedy’s visit to Globeville, the importance of industry to the neighborhood, and its future. He voices his concerns over the I-70 reconstruction, CDOT, public meetings and impact studies, the creation of the Valley Highway in the 1960s, ASARCO contamination, the land clean-up, litigation, and the City’s involvement.

Full-Text

Oral History Interview with David Oletski
November 02, 2013
Interviewer: Cyns Nelson
Interview Transcribed by Cyns Nelson
[Interview takes place at the Valdez-Perry Branch Library in Denver, Colorado.]
00:00 CN: Today is November 02, 2013. My name is Cyns Nelson, and I’m conducting oral histories with residents from the Globeville, Elyria, and Swansea neighborhoods. This interview is part of the Denver Public Library’s “Creating Your Community” project, and the oral history will be archived with the Western History Department. Right now I’m talking with David Oletski, a longtime resident of the Globeville neighborhood.
So, start by telling me your full name; and tell me when and where you were born, and say something about your upbringing.
DO: My name is Dave Oletski. I was born in Globeville, make in 1954. Born and raised a Catholic, of Polish descent. Uh—
CN: Siblings?
DO: Yeah. I have four brothers and a sister—four boys and a girl. We have a very large family, Polish family. When my grandmother died, in ’78, we had 103 kids and grandkids, and ALL in Denver. We all went to the St. Joseph’s Polish church, between St. Joseph’s and Holy Rosary; that’s in the Globeville neighborhood. They’re both 100-year-old institutions.
So, we have deep roots in Globeville, and in the family.
CN: And you were born in Globeville?
DO: Yes.
CN: What was the address where you were born at? Do you know?
DO: I want to say 601 East 49th—No, no. My fault. It was 4920 Logan, and then we moved over. And now I live at 4930 Logan, so I’m right next door to where I was born.
CN: Really?
DO: Yes.
CN: What schools did you go to?
DO: St. Joe’s [Joseph] Grade School. Polish grade school, in Globeville. And then I went to St. Joe’s High School, on 6th and Galapago. My sister went to Cathedral, which was a Catholic school. My two older brothers went to Annunciation, which was up in East Denver.
So we stayed in the area. There was a lot of Catholic kids, and a lot of them our family—like I said—I mean, we had a HUGE family, back then.
CN: So, talk about the Globeville neighborhood. You’ve lived there your WHOLE life?
DO: I was gone ten years.
CN: Okay.
DO: I was gone—I was married and lived in Arvada. Came back and bought the folks’ place; I had two houses. I lived in one, they lived in the other until they passed. And, I stayed. I was gonna leave—
CN: So when is it that you moved back to Globeville?
DO: (Pause for thought.) Ninety … ’90? ’89? Yeah. I was gone from, like, ’79 to ’89. But, I still came to Globeville every day, because I worked in Nabisco on 40th—which is Bruce Randolph School now. That used to be Nabisco, we made dog bones. So, every day on my way to work—I usually worked swing—I’d stop at the folks’ and visit and go into work. Or, if I worked graveyard, I’d get off in the morning and stop at the folks’.
Yeah. I’ve been in Globeville all my life, because when you—on the way home from work or way to work, you know, my dad would always have some chores to do. Or else you had to run down to the church for something, or run down to school because they were doing something. And then the Parish. So, you know, you stay connected.
CN: Describe the neighborhood for me. Somebody who’s never been here—
DO: Then or now?
CN: Let’s start with now.
04:26 DO: Now. You know, it’s run down. It’s in need of repair. You know, we’ve been—and in 2014 it IS in the budget to get residential trash cans. Uh--They claim Globeville is one of the poorest neighborhoods; but at the same time, they give us no resources. You know, it needs—it needs a deep cleaning, is what it really needs. And, it’s starting; and homes need to be repaired. There’s a lot of home owners, elderly, and there’s a lot of rental property. But that’s starting to change, as of now. It’s—we need a Rec [Recreation] Center. We have two—one rec center was given away to a non-profit, and they’re trying to run it, and they just don’t have the funds. The other one is Stapleton Rec [Recreation] on 51st and Broadway. It’s a dinosaur. It’s been there since the ‘60s. So there’s no—there’s no amenities for the kids. It’s just tough.
We’re six minutes to Coors Field. We’re very close to downtown. I think we’re the best-kept secret there is. It’s going to take some work to bring it back. We’re working at it; we’ve been working at it. And I think it’s starting to turn the corner now; we’re starting to get the Light Rail in. The highway project really isn’t going to affect us; it’ll affect Swansea and Elyria. They’ll do a lot of build out there. The Stock Show is going to go ahead and rebuild, or bring in new development, so that’s going to be a plus.
What’s really irritating is: We have junkyards that they—they call them “auto recycling centers.” But they’re glorified junkyards. They contaminate the ground; oils and gases and brake fluids and transmission fluid. You know, it’s an industry—but it’s right next to the river, right next to our waterway. So they’re contaminating water; they’re contaminating underground water, they’re contaminating the ground. It’s kind of tough, because nobody will confront them on it. I think—In Globeville we’ve always had heavy industry. And anytime you have prosperity like that, you need cleanup. When it’s all done you gotta clean up the mess.
But we’ve been through enough ordeals—we’re an old neighborhood. We were established in 1889. So through 100 years we’ve seen come and goes, and we’ve had the cleanups. Nowadays, they should implements something to make these companies responsible before they even get started, so there’s not this cleanup when they’re done.
So we’re fighting with that one. It just—I don’t understand it. I don’t understand. We talked about—they’re all sliding in under the “recycling,” the “green environment” and this and that, and they’re polluting. What is THIS about? (Ironic laugh.) It’s frustrating, very frustrating. Because, at one end we’re making headway and at the other end we’re like—two steps forward and five steps back. And this is a constant battle.
I don’t know if it’s for economics for the city. I don’t know what they’re plan is; I don’t know what they’re logic is. They never talk about it. They just kind of ignore it, push it off to the side. They don’t want to HEAR it. I don’t know if _____ [?] aren’t qualified to deal with it? Or is it bigger than they think; or it will take too long, and the officials don’t want to spend that kind of time, because they have to go on to their next endeavor—to what they’re going to be elected to or where they’re moving on to. I think they don’t want to spend their career cleaning up an eye sore.
I don’t know, I don’t know. They won’t give us an answer. I like asking; but there’s no answer.
09:37 CN: So, in what ways ARE you participating in the kinds of conversations about the direction of the neighborhood?
DO: Well, right now we’re on that—we have Platte Farm Open Space. They’ve been behind us. But there again, it’s taken six years to get the full commitment.
CN: What’s the name of it?
DO: Platte Farm’s Open Space. It’s between 48th and 50th and Grant. There’s a valley. And they were using it as a dump site. Anybody would sneak in and dump all they could and take off. So we got it cleaned up. And we see no use for it [?] because there are big power lines running right through it; they can’t build. So, we’re doing open space. We do have—we do have wildlife down there. We’ve got some foxes, we have plenty of cottontails. Uh, geez. A lot of—I can’t name them all, can’t think of them right off hand. We’ve got that going. That project’s been going.
We’ve done painting project, painting elderly homes. This was some years ago. And then Habitat for Humanity came into Globeville. They were big. Matter of fact, we just finished up the Jimmy Carter and Rosalynn, Carter build, in Globeville. We built 11 homes, repaired 15—critical repairs on 15. So a total of 26 homes, in a one-week period. It went from October 6 to the 11th of 2013.
CN: So you JUST—
DO: Just GOT done. Yeah. It was exciting. It was VERY exciting. Because, we learned of Jimmy Carter—President Carter—coming to Globeville when I was in Haiti last year with them. Because we did the Haiti build. We built 100 homes in one week.
Globeville—we get involved with the churches. We support them any way we can. We have three 100-year-old churches in a three-block radius. And, I know I talked about contamination and things, but that’s on the outskirts of Globeville, like the borders. We have the NEIGHBORHOOD that is still intact. And it’s a beautiful neighborhood. I mean, it’s just a—it’s a little gem when it’s fixed up. And I know people can’t see what I saw, in the ‘60s. But we can get back there.
It’s a lot of work. Once you get involved in one project, you have another. I don’t mean to—I’m not disrespecting our city officials, but. Robin Kniech has been really instrumental; Judy Montero’s been behind us on things we’re doing. So they keep an open mind, they do support us. But, it just takes so long to get things done. We’ve been fighting for residential trash cans for 10 years; probably even longer. We first, now, got them in the 2014 budget. It’s like, we’re not a completely industrial neighborhood; nowadays it’s more “light” industrial. And the glorified junkyards, the recycling centers, these just came into effect in the last three to four years, they’re moving in.
When I was a kid, they weren’t allowed in Denver. They had to be in Adams County, unincorporated areas. Out of sight. And Globeville’s not out of sight. We’re right there. We have the Stock Show, we’re six minutes to Coors Field. We have three light rail stops coming in within a short distance. We have seven arteries connecting us to the south and the southwest. Part of our property goes down to Cuernavaca Park. We border Highlands, Sunnyside. The 41st Avenue light rail stop IS in Globeville. So, we’re making a lot of strides. It’s take time, and it’s going to happen. It’s going to happen. It’s exciting.
You know, Habitat—I can’t say enough about Habitat. They gave—we had a—they gave Globeville a vision.
CN: How long was that process?
DO: What do you mean?
14:52 CN: So, the process of figuring out what they were going to do, what houses, what their focus was going to be, the vision for Globeville.
DO: Habitat’s been in Globeville for like eight years.
CN: We’re talking about Habitat for Humanity, correct?
DO: Correct. At first—I mean, I was a little familiar with them, but not much. They came to our organizations, and the first thing I said was: We don’t want no more Welfare Section 8 Housing. We’re sick of it. We know it’s needed—Section 8 and Welfare, it’s needed, there’s no doubt about it. It’s a safety net; people need it. And it’s needed for handicapped—mentally and physically—and people get down on their luck. It is a safety net. But we’ve seen in Globeville, they use it as a lifestyle. It’s like, this is not—Is this an entitlement? No. It’s a safety net for when you get down on your luck. But as soon as you get back up, you got to contribute. And we see people get stuck. Or, this is the life they want to live; they don’t want to work. They want to be taken care OF. And that’s not how this neighborhood was built.
This neighborhood was built on hard work, long hours. Immigrants. We have always been a melting pot for immigrants: Polish, Russian, Irish, German; Hispanic, African Americans. Now we have Ethiopians. So Habitat has come in, with their philosophy; we’ve gotten to know them. And we’ve got to really support them, because they do a good—they doing a very good service.
So, in our process, we stand behind Habitat for Humanity a thousand percent. We will do anything for them. They are a good neighbor. Like I said, they’re helping us—they gave us a vision that we used to have, that was lost, from the ‘70s until now. And we’re starting to see people get excited.
CN: Talk about that vision, what it is.
DO: Well, you know, back in the ‘60s we had a lot of sports—we had baseball teams, football teams, softball teams, swim teams. Globeville could hold its own against ANYBODY. We were very competitive. Everybody WORKED hard. We had the beef industry, which—Colorado, from the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ’70 was the beef capital of the United States. Of the United States, mind you. And that ALL took place in Globeville. This is where all the packing houses were. People MADE big money. We were little class back then. I was explaining to my daughter, the way father, her grandfather, the prosperity they had in the ‘50s and ‘60s. The price of homes, the price of vehicles. The money they made then would be equal to $2,000 dollars a week today. And that was in Globeville.
Everybody went to parochial schools. The mothers stayed home; the fathers went to work and raised big families of five, six, seven, eight, nine children. So, there was prosperity here. We had the smelters, we had truck lines. There was union—the unions were strong. And, in the ‘70s everything just kind of moved on out to the suburbs. They came into play. A lot of people moved to the suburbs.
When I was young, the associations were very strong. They had—I mean, there was—everybody living in Globeville: There was firemen, policemen, attorneys. There was a lot of influential people. And, like I said, we had a softball field. It’s still there, but they don’t use it as much. And every night, during the summer times, they had softball games under the lights. I mean, these were competitive sports. We had a press box with an announcer that announced the games, the same way they do at Coors Field today. This was in Globeville. And everybody came to—every neighborhood; every bar or church organization had softball teams, and they’d come to Globeville to play. And they knew it was a tough play, because you’re going to get beat.
20:20 It was exciting. It was alive. It was community. And you had your Polish, Russian, German—all your nationalities. But, when something happened, like the ’65 flood, everybody put their nationalities, races aside and did what was right for the community. And that’s what I’m starting see, again. And this is the first time, since the ‘60s. And this is where Habitat is helping us, because, we’re coming together. We’re repairing homes; building homes. People are buying them. And we’re getting a sense of community.
And it’s a very diverse neighborhood. We have all the nationalities; we have all the races. We know how to get along. And now we’re looking for the amenities. I mean, you talk about bicycling—we’ve got a bicycle path, on the river, that will take you to Chatfield if you want. Or, take you to Clear Creek and you can go to Golden. You can get anywhere from Globeville.
We have I-70 and I-25 at the mousetrap. But, that there is an amenity—because, like I said, you can go anywhere from Globeville. You can GET anywhere from Globeville, in a very short time and a very short distance. We need to make some more connectivity. Put some streets through; turn some into one-ways, cul-de-sac some. We’ve got work, but now we have—we’ve got District One police department that is REALLY active. They’re really excited; they just came into Globeville in June of ’13. They’re excited to help get the neighborhood back in shape.
When I was a kid, they called it the Highlands—that was old North Denver. Now, it’s like, it’s the big place to be. And they’ve done a beautiful job up there, because it turned into a sense of community. And people are taking pride in their homes and in their yards, and every aspect of their community. And that’s all it takes. If I go out in the street and pick up some papers, and sweep the curbings, and clean my yard—and my neighbor does—before you know, it catches on. And if we all DO that, we’ve got a very clean place to live.
I mean, we had a LOT of industry back in the ‘60s, and this place was spotless. It was spotless. You wouldn’t think it, but ALL the companies back then—they had hired people just to walk around the premises and clean the premises, to keep it clean, so they didn’t litter the neighborhood.
Big trucks were not allowed to come through the neighborhood; they had the highways, they had the main arteries. They didn’t have to come through. If they did, they got in trouble—they got fined very heavily. Today, that’s something we have to work on today. We have big semis coming through the neighborhood that really can’t handle them. But it’s a shortcut. And it’s like: No, wait a minute, we have to go back. Because if they did it for many years, and we had a lot more industry back then than we do now.
A lot of ways—we go backwards, try to go forward. Right now we’re in the process of working on our neighborhood plan. This is our 20-year plan to see what we want to do with things.
CN: Who’s involved in making the neighborhood plan?
DO: We have Planning, from the city. And we have everybody from the community. Judy Montero’s part of it. Robin Kniech. Everybody’s on board. The same thing with Swansea and Elyria—they have their neighborhood plan that they’re working on. And, we’re going to make the connection with the National Western, because theirs is going on at the same time.
Then, by 2016, this place is going to be rockin’. I mean, the National Western will be done.
CN: Tell me what you know about that process; people haven’t talked all that much about—
DO: What process?
CN: About the plans for the National Western complex.
24:59 DO: The National Western just started off, they just kicked off. We took a bus ride of all 95 acres—
CN: Ninety-five acres.
DO: —that they have. And, what needs to be done. Going to be—what did they say—two-year plan and three-year build out in the process of the two-year plan. So, by 2017, it’ll be done. By the time the light rail stops are all done, the Stock Show will be done. They’re going to stay on the east side of the river, and Globeville’s on the west. So, like I said, we’ve had two meetings—no, this will be the second one. November 12th will be the second meeting. Last meeting was just introductions; took a tour of the property. And now we’re going to start looking to see—excuse me (hiccup)—what they’re going to do.
Because, they claim that the Stock Show is going to be the biggest and the best stock show in the whole United States. I mean, I guess even the world. They got people from England and all over coming in. It’s going to be exciting. It’s going to be the National—well, it’s the Events Center now, but it’s going to be the National Western Events Center. So, they’re going to be hosting a lot more events than just the stock show. Big events.
You know, we’re glad to see them stay; they were talking about leaving, but now they decided not to. It’s too centrally located. It’s an old neighborhood; it’s been here—Stock Show’s been here for over 100 years. It takes a hundred years to get a hundred years of history. You just don’t want to walk away from that. You don’t want to change the name, you want to enhance it. So there will be a lot of history. And there’ll be past, present, and future. So, we’re excited.
We’ve got so much going—there’s so many meetings. I mean, it’s just—it’s crazy. Globeville is the last part of the city to be developed. We’ve been ignored for a lot of years, but now you just can’t ignore us any longer.
And we’re going to get the glorified junkyards out of here. This is going to all turn around, because you can’t have a world-class event center on one side of the river and have junkyards and contamination on the other. I mean, what kind of—what kind of presentation is that? So we need to find out what we can do on the west side of the river, to be an asset for the Events Center. We only have one river, and it’s an asset. It’s going to take shape, and take form. Like I said: With their planning; Globeville making their plans; Swansea and Elyria doing theirs; light rail doing their part; this is just going to be, it’s going to be awesome. It’s going to be a state-of-the art thing.
And it’s kind of neat that Globeville is the last to be developed. Because everything that all the other communities have missed—we can go ahead and capitalize on, and really showcase it. That’s my hope. And I think it WILL happen. Because: Everybody’s already done, except us. So now we get to—we can go ahead and not make their mistakes. Their trial and error, and now we know what works, what doesn’t—what we have to work with, and make it better than, make it great.
Not only that, keeping the National Western where it is, keeps it in Denver—its tax base. From the National Western to Coors Field is about four minutes. Elitch’s; the Pepsi Center. Is that “Invesco” Mile High? Or did they change that again? No, Sports Authority Field at Mile High. You know, it’s right in—I don’t know. We’ve got a lot of hurdles to get over. And I think we will. The development’s going to come in. This is an opportunity to put hotels, eateries, whatever needs to be—to make the Events Center and downtown prosperous.
It’s going to happen. It’s a long time coming. And then, with Globeville being what, 124-year-old neighborhood, it’s just going to add to it. People are going to find this little gem. It’s a very quiet, sleepy little place. In the daytime it comes alive; in the evening it mellows out.
30:38 CN: Do you have any concerns, surrounding all of this development and people discovering your gem?
DO: (Pause.) Yes. We don’t want it to be taken out of character; we’d like to keep the character. We’d like to keep it—we don’t want to see big high-rise apartment buildings. Maybe in some areas, but as far as: We have little bungalows. We want it to be done right. We don’t want things to get over crowded—which, I don’t think it will.
I think the city, the city planners, different organizations—we can see the mistakes everybody else has made and are making. Highlands—beautiful neighborhood—but, they’re doing so many scrape-and-builds, with high-rises, it’s like: It’s heartbreaking. There’s no parking. Now, they can do some of that in Globeville. There’s places for it. But then, not in the middle of a block where there’s homes.
There’s plenty of open space where they can do that type of thing. That’s the asset—that’s an asset we have. We’ve GOT the open space where they can—we can have a mixture. And we want to be diverse. That’s the way it is. We need a little of everything. We don’t want just one thing to dominate the whole process or the whole neighborhood. And I don’t think we are.
In Globeville we’re looking for the next best thing. It’s kind of like, from the 1880s, Globeville Smelter smelted gold and silver. That was cutting-edge technology back then. It was the industry. And then we rolled right into being the beef capital of the United States. I mean, you’d think—with all this prosperity—you’d think that Globeville’s streets would be lined with gold and silver; they brought so much money into the state. We, being as old as we are, as much industry, we are really responsible—Globeville’s the one that really built this city, with all the prosperity and all the tax base, and everything they did. I think it’s time to bring some back.
At the same time: Globeville’s looking for the next hot industry. Probably won’t be industrial. Maybe technology. We don’t know. We’d like to see—we did the Carter thing; I talked to GRID Alternatives, about the Habitat for Humanity. They’re talking about making it a solar community.
CN: “GRID Alternatives”?
DO: GRID Alternatives. Yeah. Groundwork Denver is really active in Globeville. They’ve been a big partner of ours. They’re the ones that have really spear-headed Platte Farms Open Space. They’ve been dealing with everybody. They’re a non-profit. They do a lot of energy audits, and helping people get their homes worked on: windows, lead-base paint, insulation.
So we have a lot going on. We don’t know. We’re looking for the direction, the next—and, with the Events Center coming, that’s going to be huge. And the light-rail stops. The old Denver Post on 40th and Fox—41st and Fox. They had 45 acres. That’s the 25/70 project [by Ascendant Development Corp.] —that’s going to be arts, food, and fashion.
CN: Really?
DO: Yes. They’re kicking that off. So, everything’s coming. It’s going to get crazy. It’s getting hectic already, and it’s going to get more so.
35:10 CN: What about the reconstruct of I-70. What do you know about that?
DO: Well. You know, they’re looking to take it underground.
CN: Underground?
DO: Instead of being above, like it is. They want to take it ground level, take it under and cap it. That’s a good idea. I’m kind of frustrated with them. Because, they want to make it, like, eight to ten lanes wide. Because there’s emergency lanes, medians, and things like that.
CN: And who is the “them”? Who’s planning it?
DO: C-DOT [Colorado Department of Transportation]. You know, the mayor had a meeting to let us know that it would not be going to the south, because Purina puts in a million dollars in the school coffer a year, or whatever. They’re too big of an asset. So it wouldn’t be going to the south; it’ll be going to the north.
Now, there’s another group that wants to move I-70 out altogether. And I wished they would have worked on that five years ago, because it is a wise idea: to take I-70, hook it into 76, and bring it around. That would take it completely out of the city. I had asked at a meeting that the mayor was at—I was the last one to speak—and I asked them: This is going to be in Swansea and Elyria, it’s going to be eight to ten lanes wide, what was your impact study for The Mousetrap? [“Mousetrap” is informal reference to the interchange of I-70 and I-25] Which is in Globeville. And, they said they didn’t do one. So, how can you widen a highway to that degree and not do an impact study to where it bottlenecks? It already bottlenecks now, and it’ll back up. It’s just going to be more so.
So, I don’t if they—see, I don’t know what their thinking is. Now, I’ll tell you MY honest opinion, is that: I had read somewhere that they said that this highway could probably last another 15 years.
CN: The present—
DO: Yes, the present highway. And, see Swansea and Elyria—they can’t come together on what they want. They are always bickering. It’s like: You have to get on the same page, and you have to go in one direction. You have to DECIDE. And now this new group is trying to get these other aspects studied. I don’t if they’re too late. According to the city and C-DOT, they’re going to start construction on 2016. There again: Everything is happening at once. Are they going to start? Or are they going to push it back and say, “Oh no. It can last 15 more years.” I hope they don’t do that. Because, that highway should have been replaced 20 years ago; but it definitely should have been done 10 years ago.
CN: What makes you say that?
DO: It’s falling down. It’s breaking up. Too much weight. I don’t know if it could withstand an earthquake. To me, my opinion is: Being where it’s at, they’re going to wait until somebody gets killed. They won’t SAY that. I don’t know. Nobody wants to make—nobody want to step on anyone’s toes; nobody wants to make a decision; nobody wants to speak up, say “This is what has to be done. DO it.” Everybody just is too busy. Like I said, our officials—to me—are looking for their next move. “I’ll be out of office; I’ll be gone. Let so-and-so deal with it.”
Basically, it’s not Globeville’s concern, until they decide what they’re going to do. And then, they have to decide what they’re going to do with The Mousetrap; because they just rebuilt The Mousetrap, and they under-built it.
So, come on. I know they’re better than this. They’re better than this. Like I said, the best solution would be that they WOULD it out—take it and break it off over into I-76, circle it around the city. There’s a lot of vacant land out there. They should have done that when they built it. That was—my grandfather, and uncles, and dad, and everybody fought to get that done. And they refused to do it back then.
CN: Really.
DO: Yeah, when they were building it. So, here we are; 50 years later, with the same problem. Doing the same thing over and over, you’re going to get the same results. You’ve got to do something different to get different results.
But, there again. Who’s going to step up? Is it the mayor? Or—who’s going to step up?
40:43 CN: What do you remember about that? When the highway was first put in, in the ‘50s and into the ‘60s.
DO: In the ‘60s—what I remember about that—I was going to school at St. Joe’s, grade school, and the nuns said—they were all nuns—and we’d look out the window, because we were two stories, “That highway is going to be higher than the Coliseum, the dome.” And we were little kids, like WOW. But what I REALLY remember, was when John—President Kennedy—came from the airport. I think he was campaigning; or was he the president; or he was being elected. The highway was under construction, so he had to come through Globeville, he had to come down 46th Avenue. And all the kids—school kids—we were all out there. And they came by slow, and I got to shake his hand. That, to me, was like: That was awesome.
And then, some years later, I got to meet President Carter. So, two presidents. But, yeah, that was a big deal: John Kennedy came through Globeville. I mean, not only the school kids, from the school, but EVERYBODY was lined up. I think everybody who was living in Globeville was lined up. People were getting off work early to be there, for this big moment—to see him drive in front of the school. It was awesome.
I guess, maybe, to other people it doesn’t mean much. But, to us it does. And then to have a president come to work here for a week? And Garth Brooks, Trisha Yearwood, they were here.
CN: Oh, really.
DO: Yeah. They were fun. But they were in Haiti, too. Good people.
CN: So, it sounds like you’ve been involved in a LOT of different ways. You mentioned the Habitat for Humanities, and Platte Farms Open Space. What other organizations—neighborhood, community—have you been involved in?
DO: Partners Against Graffiti. I’ve been in the top, top committee. Oh, I was on a committee for economic development, to decide the fate of a building, what non-profit we were going to give it to. Groundworks Denver. The National Western committee. I’m the president of Globeville Civic Association. Uhhhhh. That’s about it, off the top of my mind.
CN: (Laughing.)
DO: (Laughing.) I’m sure there’s more! I just can’t—
CN: That’s good enough!
DO: You know, I’ve been involved, working closely with Brownfield, with the remediation of Asarco property. Everybody was part of that: Bobby Escamilla and his wife Margaret. That was the Asarco-Escamilla lawsuit. My father—father and uncle and them were very instrumental in that.
CN: What was involved in the cleanup? That was in the ‘80s, correct?
DO: Yes. Well, they’re cleaning it up now. That was cadmium and everything—Asarco had contaminated the ground for a hundred years—coming out of their smokestacks and things. Like I said: To us, it was just prosperity. And now they’ve got to clean it up. And that’s why we should have learned from that. And especially in Globeville, because of all the mitigation and litigation that we’ve been through? It shouldn’t even be tolerated in Globevill for three seconds. And it’s, like: Where are our city officials? Where is the Health Department? Where are our—who is governing this? Who is the watchdog on this? Why isn’t there different things put into—we know so much more, now. Why aren’t we using it? Why? That’s the big question.
45:13 So, I continue to work. There’ll be other committees, other groups coming in, trying to do things. And Globeville’s always been—every non-profit there is, there’s somebody who gets an idea to try to grab money to come to Globeville to do it. “Oh, we can go to that old neighborhood; they’re poor, we can go ahead and get these grant monies. We can do this and that.” It’s like: No. Go somewhere else. We’ve been through enough of this. We KNOW scabs when we see them. They come to town all the time. And everybody’s got one. They think Globeville’s just easy pickings. But it’s going to get tougher.
So, there’s frustration, still. I’m one—I don’t walk away from them. Trying to get people involved—you know, people are working so hard now to survive, they don’t have time to really get involved, like they used to. To go to the meetings, to do what has to be done. Hopefully—and that’s going to turn around. I believe in it.
As soon as the neighborhood gets a little bit—more on its feet. Just a little more gentrified, or whatever. Right now, it’s been a forgotten neighborhood. People have been able to live on welfare, and Section 8, and make it a lifestyle, and be comfortable in Globeville, because they weren’t bothered. They didn’t have to get up and go to work, and things like that. I see that’s a BIG problem, and that has to change. That mindset, that mentality has to change. Because, most of the people on it don’t need it. They shouldn’t be on it. They’re too young. And that’s their lifestyle. Why should we have to tolerate their lifestyle? So, it’s either get involved—and 90 percent of the people aren’t like that, in Globeville. BUT, they just, for some odd reason don’t want to get involved. They don’t want to speak up. I don’t know why.
But I see them starting to come back, come together a little more. As things get better, things will cleaner, they’ll start seeing more prosperity. I think, with—I don’t know, might be a lot of depression, I don’t know.
CN: I wanted to ask you about what you see for the future. And, you’ve touched on it a bit. And, I’d like to know if you have anything more specific that—what do you think this neighborhood is going to look like 20 years from now?
DO: (Pause.) Oh, I think it’s going to—20 years from now, it’s hard to describe. I think we’ll see a lot of the old days come back. I think it’ll be really clean. It will be cleaned up. I think we’ll see everybody’s homes in repair again. Probably some new builds. I think it’s going to be a beautiful neighborhood in 20 years. It’s just going to be one of the gateways to the city. Well, it IS going to be the gateway, from Adams County to the city.
I think it’s going to be awesome. It’s going to be—I mean, it’s all here. We have all the ingredients. It’s just us putting it together. Help guiding the development, the new development. Just perfecting it. It’s going to be the place to be. People are going to want to be here, because—we KNOW gas will never go down in price again. So, we’re sitting—people talk about, “Oh, you’re close to the light-rail stop. Everything’s going to happen.” Well yeah, but we’re right smack by everything that’s happening. (Laughs.) I mean, this is our backyard! Where everything is happening. We’ve got LoDo, we’ve got the Events Center, we’ve got Coors, we’ve got—we’ve got it all right here. It’s right here, outside our doors.
50:27 You know, you can jump on a bike, and you can ride to a baseball game. What they do with the river—I think they’re going to do something really awesome with the river. People say how awesome—what is it, the Austin riverwalk is. It’s like: This is going to happen in Globeville, it’s going to happen right here, on the river. There’s only one river, and it’s coming through Globeville. The Asarco property, there’s another 80 acres up there, and it sits on a hill and it overlooks Denver. There’s only one hill left—we’ve got it.
In the morning, early in the morning all the buildings downtown look crisp and frosty, like silver; and in the evening, when the sun sets, they just turn to gold. It’s just an awesome place. People haven’t seen it yet. They haven’t seen the things we’ve seen, in 50 years. We’ve seen so many different things happen. Different views; been in different spots, and seen possibilities. But they’re starting to. Well, they’re even more than starting to.
Will they really study the river. And, I think this project with the National Western is really going to kick it all off. And people are—it’s just common sense. Price gets to $5, $6 dollars a gallon, bicycles are going to come out more. We’ve got the bike path, right here in Globeville. We’ve just got to make more connections in the center.
Not everybody wants to live in a condo or apartment. And that’s where Globeville’s ideal, because they have little homes, where you can have a little home that’s a little bigger than your condo. Plus you can have a little garage, a little garden, a little hot tub. You can have it all, in a nice, confined area. You can have it all, right here in Globeville. People don’t know that yet, but they’re going to find out.
And, in 20 years—Eh, I don’t know if I’ll be here. We’ll see in 20 years. But I think it’s going to be good. It is. It’s already happening. It’s just, it’s not come together yet. People can’t find the vision, they can’t see the vision that those of us that have been here—like I said, we’ve seen glimmers of different things. And when you look at the real potential that Globeville has, compared to anyone else--nobody else has a river. Highlands doesn’t have a river.
The river is a big asset. And, people can see—well, the Pro Challenge came on the scene a couple years ago, and it exploded. I think Globeville will be, possibly, a big bicycle community. I mean, it’s right here. It would be foolish not to. At the same time—it’s right here; but then it’s secluded. You know what I mean. It’s kind of like—you can go home and have your little peace of mind, your piece of serenity, which—when you’re living in the inner city you don’t have that. You’ve got movement all the time. And in Globeville you don’t, because of the way we’re situated, the way the boundaries are with Adams County and different things. It kind of keeps us tucked away. But, at the same time we’re close, if that makes sense.
54:46 Where I live—and we’ve always called it “Pollock Valley,” because my family’s been down there—I’ll be sitting there in the summertime, and it’s so peaceful and quiet, I think I’m in the country. And then a couple blocks away you have all this hustle and bustle. You’ve got I-70, I-25 moving. But in the summertime, I just sit in peace and quiet. And that’s all the way through Globeville.
Like I said, we have a lot of wildlife down in the valley. And it’s going to be—it’s a very special place. And whoever comes down there, they can see it. And they feel it. When you can FEEL something, that’s when you’ve got it. And Globeville’s got the feeling. People, on the Habitat build, people coming from all over—and one gentleman in particular, his name was Mo Siegel, he was the founder of Celestial Seasonings, he worked with me all week. And he was like, “Wow! This place—I never knew this existed.”
Everybody. A lot of people on Habitat builds are awesome people. They’re successful people; they want to come and help. But when they come to Globeville—you know, I had some girls from EXIT Realty. We were pretty much done, and they couldn’t believe this neighborhood existed. They were young. And they were like, “Well, LoDo is there—“ so, they said, “We’re going to go drive the neighborhood for the afternoon, and see what possibilities we have here.”
People are discovering it. And they’re like: Where did this come from? How did we not see this? How did—nobody knew it was here. But then when you can also FEEL it. People will—it’s quite amazing when you see that whole change take—when you see the amazement take place, when they really see it and feel it. They don’t forget it. They don’t forget it. And then they know where Globeville’s at. Eh, that’s about all I can say, about all I know.
CN: That’s perfect. So, we’ve touched on all of the areas—I think—I had intended. Is there anything else that we haven’t talked about that you wanted to specifically mention?
DO: No, I think I’ve given credit to some people; got to slam officials, too. It’s just—(laughs)—you know, it’s just frustrating. I mean, I want it to happen FASTER than it is. We wanted it to happen, for years, you know. And now it’s going to happen. And now, it’s kind of like: Is this reality? Or is this another illusion? Is this a mirage—you know what I mean?
What’s really kind of in my mind is: Is it really going to happen? We have all this, coming together. But is it going to happen? Because it HASN’T happened. So now, it’s kind of like: Show me. Show us it’s going to happen. We feel it; we think it; we can imagine it. But IS it? I guess that’s the other question—I guess that’s the other thing we’re going to have to see, IS it going to happen? We’re waiting for the other shoe to drop. We see it going two steps forward, five steps back. We see that. What’s going to happen? Is there going to be something that will really set us back?
I think we’ve got everything in place. We have the tools and everything to go forward—but is it really going to happen? That’s where, I guess that’s the big question. Because, once you’ve seen negativity for so long, it’s hard to stay positive. But you still keep fighting: It’s got to happen, it’s going to happen. We’ve got to keep pushing forward. We can’t stop. And that’s the way Globeville always was: We were a HARD working, HARD playing neighborhood. Everybody that lived in Globeville had a real work ethic; they would work for hours and hours and hours.
My father, and uncles—the house I own, that I bought from my father, they built that AFTER they got off of working the packing house all day.
59:58 CN: They built your own—
DO: The built their own homes. But they built MY home—back in ’60, ’61—AFTER work. Every night after work. And (laughs), and I remember the day it happened—but they ALWAYS took Sunday off. Sunday was a church day; Sunday was a family day. They tried to work one Sunday, to try to get ahead of things. Everything went wrong; that day they were framing, and the frames collapsed. Everything—nothing would let them move forward. And they all said: We’re not working; we’re not going to try to push it on Sundays any more. We take Sunday off.
My dad was freaking out. Because, he started in April, building. It had to be done by the time the snow flew. I mean, we were in it in—by the time school started we were in it. These guys were not in the—these guys were butchers; they worked in the packing houses. But they had the skill to build homes. I’ve got a beautiful home. My grandfather did all the hardwood floors. It has all the old, coved ceilings—the plaster ceilings. Yeah. These guys had skills.
Coming up, we were ALWAYS rebuilding somebody’s house. Laying cement, putting on additions, remodeling kitchens, bathrooms, and what not. Constantly. And that was after work. You always did it after work. And these guys—they built the house after work. And they always took Sundays off. So, it was kind of like: It was a family day, church day.
So, that was quite impressive—to watch all this unfold. AND, still find time to go work on the church and the school. Because, the parishioners worked on the school. We used to paint the school every year, to get it ready for school the next year. It’s kind of like: You kind of hated living in the neighborhood and going to school there too. And that’s the way things were done. There was no big government handouts. Wasn’t there.
All these millions of dollars they’ve got to have—what, $950 million dollars, annually? Right under a billion? Come on people. People have got to start par-ti-ci-pating (slapping hand on table). And that’s what life is about—participation. You’ve got to participate in your own life, and in Globeville we have. And we’re starting to see that again—people participating. Been a long time coming.
Anyway. That’s all I got.
CN: Okay!
DO: I could go on all day long—I think, as you know!
CN: (Laughing.) Well, this has been great. I really appreciate your taking the time to be here, and being agreeable to being recorded.
DO: Yeah.
1:03:18 [End of interview.]

In 1954, David Oletski, was born at 4920 Logan Street in the Globeville neighborhood of Denver, Colorado. One of six children, he was raised in a large extended family of Polish Catholics. At the time of his grandmother’s death in 1978, he had 103 cousins living in Denver. During his youth his family was active in St. Joseph Catholic Church and Holy Rosary Church, both in the Globeville neighborhood. He attended St. Joseph’s Elementary and High Schools in Denver. For several decades David worked at the Nabisco plant in Globeville. For ten years he lived in Arvada, Colorado, returning to Globeville in 1989. David has been involved in several neighborhood and civic associations, including serving as president of Globeville Civic Association, member of Partners Against Graffiti, economic development committees, National Western Committee, Brown Fields and the ASARCO/Escamilla lawsuit and remediation. He currently lives next door to where he was born.

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Notes

In this interview David Oletski describes Globeville both past and present, the lack of city resources and recreation centers, need of neighborhood repairs, junk yard contamination and commercial pollution. He also discusses improvements and changes that are coming to area including a RTD station and National Western Stock Show, Platforms Open Space, Section 8 housing, and the 2013 Habitat for Humanity project to repair twenty-six homes in the neighborhood. He also discusses the flood of 1965, John F. Kennedy’s visit to Globeville, the importance of industry to the neighborhood, and its future. He voices his concerns over the I-70 reconstruction, CDOT, public meetings and impact studies, the creation of the Valley Highway in the 1960s, ASARCO contamination, the land clean-up, litigation, and the City’s involvement.